House votes to derail Obamacare, fund government

Rep. Mark Meadows, R-N.C, center, Rep. Tom Graves, R-Ga., right, and other conservative Republicans discuss their goal of obstructing the Affordable Care Act, popularly known as Obamacare, as part of a strategy to pass legislation to fund the government, on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, Sept. 19, 2013.

J. Scott Applewhite, Associated Press

Summary

The GOP-controlled House voted Friday to cripple President Barack Obama's health care law as part of a risky ploy that threatens a partial shutdown of the government in a week and a half.

“There's no reason the American people should have to face this train wreck.”

Rep. Tom Price, R-Ga.

WASHINGTON — The GOP-controlled House voted Friday to cripple President Barack Obama's health care law as part of a risky ploy that threatens a partial shutdown of the government in a week and a half.

The fight is coming on a stopgap funding measure required to keep the government fully running after the Oct. 1 start of the new budget year. Typically, such measures advance with sweeping bipartisan support, but tea party activists forced GOP leaders — against their better judgment — to add a provision to cripple the health care law that is the signature accomplishment of Obama's first term.

Republicans welcomed the vote, saying the new health care law is a disaster that is forcing cutbacks in workers' hours, raising health insurance premiums and being implemented unfairly. House Republicans have voted more than 40 times to disable all or part of the health care law.

"There's no reason the American people should have to face this train wreck," said Rep. Tom Price, R-Ga.

The partisan 230-189 vote sets the stage for a confrontation with the Democratic-led Senate, which promises to strip the health care provision from the bill next week and challenge the House to pass it as a simple, straightforward funding bill that President Barack Obama will sign.

"Republicans are simply postponing for a few days the inevitable choice they must face: Pass a clean bill to fund the government, or force a shutdown," said Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev. The White House promises Obama will veto the measure in the unlikely event it reaches his desk.

At a post-vote rally by House Republicans, Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, called the measure's approval "a victory today for the American people" and turned the spotlight on the Democratic Senate.

"Our message to the United State Senate is real simple: The American people don't want the government shut down, and they don't want Obamacare," he said to cheers from his GOP colleagues. "The House has listened to the American people. Now it's time for the United States Senate to listen to them as well."

The fight over the must-do funding bill comes as Washington is bracing for an even bigger battle over increasing the government's borrowing cap to make sure the government can pay its bills. Democrats say they won't be held hostage and allow Republicans to use the must-pass measures as leverage to win legislative victories that they otherwise couldn't.

The No. 2 House Democrat, Steny Hoyer of Maryland said the GOP ploy is a "blatant act of hostage-taking" fueled by Republicans' "destructive obsession with the repeal of the Affordable Care Act and its unrestrained hostility towards government."

Republicans countered that the measure is required to prevent a government shutdown that would delay pay for federal workers, send non-essential federal workers home, close national parks and shutter passport offices. Essential programs like air traffic control, food inspection and the Border Patrol would keep running, and Social Security benefits, Medicare and most elements of the new health care law would continue.

"If this legislation is not enacted and we embark on a government shutdown, the consequences are severe: Our brave men and women of our military don't get paid; our recovering economy will take a huge hit, and our most vulnerable citizens — including the elderly and veterans who rely on critical government programs and services — could be left high and dry," said House Appropriations Committee Chairman Harold Rogers, R-Ky.

Popular Comments

This is truly the most high-stakes, ill-conceived temper tantrum in the history
of humankind; the conservative House needs to grow up.

I want
nothing more than for the Republican Party to cease to exist in American
politics but a
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10:16 a.m. Sept. 20, 2013

Top comment

Tators

Hyrum, UT

Recent polls have shown Obamacare to be a very unpopular law. The majority of
people no longer want it. The more that is found out about it, the more
unpopular it becomes. The House is simply listening to the public in trying to
defund Obamacare.
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10:20 a.m. Sept. 20, 2013

Top comment

1978

Salt Lake City, UT

In every public opinion poll taken a solid majority of American oppose
Obamacare. According to the CBO we can not afford it. Obama and the Senate
Democrats are not listening to the public or the CBO. The Republicans are doing
the right thing.
More..